Various methods and apparatus have been used in the past for drying clothes and other articles found in either household or commercial laundry operations. Such other articles are, for examples, towels, sheets, laboratory coats and the like.
Many prior art apparatus, used in the drying of clothes, merely involve the heating of the clothes by various means together with the tumbling of the clothes in, for example, a rotary drum apparatus. Some prior art methods of heating involve the use of electrical resistance heating and gas burner heating, both of which were normally used when the clothes were in an ambient pressure situation.
However, other prior art drying methods included applying a vacuum to the articles being dried or the introduction of radio frequency current flow into the articles. Such a prior art method is disclosed, for example, for use in the drying of rayon thread cakes, in U.S. Pat. No. 2,325,652.
The major problem in connection with prior art methods and apparatus is the time needed to dry the damp articles.